Canadian GP: Lotus Friday report

CANADIAN GRAND PRIX FRIDAY PRACTICE
Back in Canada for Lotus Racing's debut at Montreal's Circuit
Gilles Villeneuve and Friday's practice sessions saw Lotus Racing
comfortably ahead of their new team rivals, and edging ever closer to...

CANADIAN GRAND PRIX FRIDAY PRACTICE

Back in Canada for Lotus Racing's debut at Montreal's Circuit
Gilles Villeneuve and Friday's practice sessions saw Lotus Racing
comfortably ahead of their new team rivals, and edging ever closer to the
midfield. Heikki Kovalainen completed his entire program and finished FP2
less than seven tenths behind Alguersuari's Toro Rosso, but Jarno
Trulli suffered an electrical problem that curtailed his running in both
sessions.

Heikki Kovalainen (Lotus Cosworth T127-01 / FP1: 24 laps, 19th, 1.21.869
/ FP2: 35 laps, 19th, 1.19.969): "Both sessions were pretty good
today. The circuit obviously has not been used for a little while and it
was quite dirty to start with, and even at the end of the second session
the grip level was still quite low, but it's definitely improving
though! It felt a bit like a Rally Finland stage first thing this
morning, so it could only get better from there!

"I think the team did a really good job today, improving the
balance and keeping us going in the right direction all the time. The low
downforce package seems to be working really well, which is very
encouraging, and again, we're not far away from the Toro Rossos.
Maybe tomorrow in qualifying, I'll be able to have a go at
challenging them, and see what happens. We're going to focus on
keeping the rear of the car under control, and I think we are getting
there with that, so, from my side of the garage, things are working out
really well."

Jarno Trulli (Lotus Cosworth T127-03 / FP1: 12 laps, 21st, 1.22.543 /
FP2: 11 laps, 22nd,1.21.346): "It's been a difficult day but
I'll move on from this and I still feel positive - after all, this
is still our first season, and we're only eight races in. I had a
few laps, but not enough to get a setup I felt comfortable with. I could
feel that both the hard and the soft tyres suffered bad degradation, but
after today I want to thank the team for working very hard to fix the
problems on my car, and we'll see if the luck will change
tomorrow."

Mike Gascoyne, Chief Technical Officer: "It was difficult today - a
couple of reliability problems curtailed Jarno's running, but with
Heikki we completed everything we wanted to, so that's a plus. The
tyre performance is always difficult on the first day here, but
especially so today, so we'll have to see how that develops
tomorrow - it could be interesting. Overall, Heikki's performance
was good, but apologies to Jarno for the issues - despite those,
I'm sure we can get both cars up where we want them
tomorrow."

Tony Fernandes, Team Principal: "It was obviously a bit of a tough
session out there, a dirty track and a couple of issues for Jarno, but we
still showed we keep picking up speed, finishing FP2 just over three
seconds off the outright pace. Both Jarno and Heikki are upbeat, and the
main aim now is to bring both cars home on Sunday - if we do that
I'll be very happy."